Despite sparse attendance, the Rampage, Florida A&M University’s only non Greek-affiliated organization, thoroughly entertained patrons of its first major step show in Lee Hall this past Friday.
In addition to their own performances, Rampage invited the 2008 Homecoming Dorm Step Show’s winning step teams, McGuinn & Diamond and Gibbs Hall.
Attendees were also entertained by students from Morehouse College’s Graves Hall, who were featured on Black Entertainment Television’s 2008 showing of “Spring Bling with Rampage.”
Shocking its spectators, Rampage opened the show with a video presentation of a crazed female who kept seeing scary images and eventually had a “Mental Breakdown.”
Upon the video’s conclusion, strobe lights illuminated the auditorium and awakened the slumbering steppers.
As the second scene opened, McGuinn & Diamond launched their presidential stepping campaign in recognition of Barack Obama as the victorious United States presidential elect. Playing on words, three steppers leaned forward, being upheld by fellow team members on the ground, for several seconds.
Other highlights included a showing of Barack Obama raising the bar for blacks in America, while also doubling as the symbol for a cellular phone, showing all bars and asking “Can you hear me now?”
If they weren’t awakened at this point, Gibbs hall certainly did the job by holding a pose for well over a minute.
They showed the audience how to step with a combination of precision and thunderous steps, in attempt to awaken their team members who were said to be dead. Steps from this group, also known as G Phi, were loud and thunderous … so much that wood chips arose from the ground as they executed several combinations and formations to prove their livelihood.
After a few performances from unsigned rap artists, Famuans were entertained by what Dominque Glover, 22, of Morehouse’s Graves Hall step team, called a “best of the best” show.
“We took the best of six years, compiling steps that we liked along with those that got the most reaction from the audience,” said Glover, a preparer of the routine from Toledo, Ohio.
“It’s been a long time sine we performed in a step show, but it was exciting … FAMU [audience participants] made it that way,” Glover said.
From funny faces and characterization to difficult combinations and formations, they certainly pleased the audience, adding to what some considered the best stepping they’d ever seen.
“It was so funny, but it showed what real stepping is,” said Alicia White, 18, a freshman from Chicago.
Having performed in step shows herself and seeing Greek and non-Greeks step, White said she looks forward to attending another one of Rampage’s events and believes it raised the bar for the 2009 Homecoming Dorm Step Show participants.
Members of Rampage were unavailable for comment.